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The buffs mentioned in this week's developer update have arrived on the PTR and we have Mercy getting upgrades to her Ult, Reaper getting less shotgun spread and more life steal, Roadhog getting plenty of changes to hook cooldown and momentum, bullet spread and knockback of his Ult, and Symmetra charging her primary fire faster. The rest is the usual bug fixes and a new option for Windows Spatial Audio.

An option to use Windows Spatial Audio is now available. This feature can be found in the Windows Start Menu under Control Panel > Hardware and Sound > Sound > Speaker Device > Spatial Sound

Developer Comments:Since launch, we’ve supported Dolby Atmos for players who use headphones, and we’re now expanding this support to include the Windows 10 implementation for spatial audio. Spatial audio is configured in the Windows 10 sound settings and will take priority over the settings in the game client. This will allow for more options, including settings for Windows Sonic Headphones, Dolby Atmos for Headphones, and Dolby Atmos for Home Theater.

HERO UPDATES

General

Made jump height consistent across hero roster

Mercy

Valkyrie

Ultimate cost reduced 15%

Healing per second increased from 50 to 60

Developer Comments:Mercy’s ultimate was charging a bit too slowly after her base healing was reduced in a previous update. These changes should restore some of her ultimate’s strength and let it build up more quickly.

Reaper

Hellfire Shotguns

Spread randomization reduced by 50%

The Reaping

Life steal increased from 20% to 30% of damage dealt

Developer Comments:Reaper’s specialty is fighting at a very close range. The more consistent spread pattern and increase in healing from his passive ability will make him more capable of standing toe-to-toe with his enemies.

Roadhog

Chain Hook

Decreased the delay before pulling a hooked target from 0.5 seconds to 0.3 seconds

Now greatly reduces the target’s momentum upon being hooked

Cooldown now begins immediately, instead of after the target has been pulled

Developer Comments:Roadhog is receiving several large changes to make his abilities more consistent. His Chain Hook had issues with breaking when enemy targets jumped or fell behind environment collision. It will now slow them down in the air more when the hook lands, and wait less time before it starts reeling them in. Since Chain Hook’s cooldown now begins immediately upon use, so it no longer varies based on Roadhog’s distance to the hook target. We’ve also moved some of the projectiles closer to the center of the spread pattern on his Scrap Gun, which gives him a more consistent damage output for its primary and alternate fire. Previously, there was a long-standing bug that caused close-range targets to fly much further than expected. After this bug was fixed, we still wanted to keep some of the knockback burst it provided, so we’ve increased the overall velocity cap to maintain some of that functionality.

Symmetra

Photon Projector

Primary fire beam charges up 20% faster

Developer Comments:It’s still difficult to use Symmetra’s Photon Projector beam effectively, even after its range was increased. By speeding up the primary fire charge rate, it takes less time to ramp up to its full damage potential and will be a stronger option when she’s presented with targets to charge up on.

BUG FIXES

A.I.

Fixed a bug that caused Mei bots to attempt landing headshots on Wrecking Ball while he was immune to them in Roll mode

Fixed a bug that caused bots to get stuck near Point A on Eichenwalde

Heroes

Brigitte

Fixed a bug that prevented Brigitte’s Whip Shot from going on cooldown if it was interrupted before the chain retracted

Doomfist

Fixed a bug that prevented victims of Doomfist’s Rocket Punch from ragdolling if they were eliminated by it

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I was super worried about the changes when they announced the characters they would be changing, especially symmetra. But these seems like reasonable changes. Mercy might be really strong again with that buff combined with Phara's tweeks.

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I was super worried about the changes when they announced the characters they would be changing, especially symmetra. But these seems like reasonable changes. Mercy might be really strong again with that buff combined with Phara's tweeks.

Reaper's change is good, and it's definitely what's needed, but the spread pattern is an overall nerf. There's too many pellets going to the outer ring and not enough in the inner or center.

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I read the "reduced randomization" as meaning there would be more in the inner circle and thus a "buff" for better aiming. Maybe I'm misunderstanding.

It means its more consistent, but that consistency can be seen as a nerf.

This quick little thing I did in paint shows what the spread would be like before the patch, and I've drawn one to show what it's like after.

Now this one is much more consistent, but that's the problem. You're going to miss so many of those outer ring pellets compared to the first ring and because of the reduced randomization (smaller red circles) you're less likely to get lucky and have it deviate onto someone.

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Now this one is much more consistent, but that's the problem. You're going to miss so many of those outer ring pellets compared to the first ring and because of the reduced randomization (smaller red circles) you're less likely to get lucky and have it deviate onto someone.

If it is like you said, it wont be a problem. All in all it is a buff for their middle/long range damage as the spread is reduced. For close range it doesnt matter much as you'll probably hit all pellets.

19 hours ago, Starym said:

Reaper

Hellfire Shotguns

Spread randomization reduced by 50%

The Reaping

Life steal increased from 20% to 30% of damage dealt ﻿

Well rip tracer. So many anti-flank heroes and so many better flank heroes. Gengu has more life, better vertical mobility and an oh-shit button + kills enemy snipers. Doomfish has more damage and oneshot potential, plus way more survivability and vertical mobility. And now reaper too. May Tracer rest is omnics.
(Im not saying it is bad to balance change, it keeps the game alive.)

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Here comes Baptiste! And he's bringing with him a whopper of a patch with a huge amount of Hero changes. There's also yet more changes to how armor works, this time in relation to damage over time effects, with them having varied greatly and being more normalized now. Damge boost also got a look and it now applies when a projectile is fired as opposed to when it his.
As far as specific Hero changes goes, we have an enormous 19 that got some changes, with Doomfist getting reduced cooldowns, Lucio getting his speed ult nerfed and regular speed buff buffed, Torbjorn with his base health buffed and ability health nefed, and a lot, LOT more.
Here's the usual rundown in video form by u/itsjieyang:
And here's the patch notes themselves:
Live Servers March 19 (source)

New Hero: Baptiste (Support)
Baptiste is battle-hardened combat medic who wields an assortment of experimental devices and weaponry to keep allies alive and eliminate his enemies. Baptiste’s Biotic Launcher fires a three-round-burst that rewards accuracy and recoil control with significant damage output. His alternate fire lobs grenades that heal allies near the point of impact. With Regenerative Burst, Baptiste activates an intense surge that heals himself and nearby allies over time. When danger is near, Baptiste can toss out his Immortality Field to prevent allies from dying. Baptiste moves around the battlefield with Exo Boots, jumping over obstacles and clearing distances that would stop other heroes. Baptiste deploys his Amplification Matrix as his ultimate, which doubles the damage and healing effects of friendly projectiles.
GENERAL UPDATES
Armor
Developer Comments: The damage taken by armor from damage over time effects, such as Widowmaker’s Venom Mine, and beam weapons, like Symmetra’s Photon Projector, varied greatly. Now it will be more consistent and predictable.
Beam-type damage is now reduced by 20% when hitting armor
Mei: Primary Fire
Moira: Alternate Fire, Coalescence
Symmetra: Primary Fire, Sentry Turret
Winston: Primary Fire
Zarya: Primary Fire
Damage over time effects are no longer mitigated by armor
Ana: Primary Fire
Ashe: Dynamite
Hanzo: Dragonstrike
Mei: Blizzard
Moira: Biotic Orb
Widowmaker: Venom Mine
Zarya: Graviton Surge
Damage Boost
Developer Comments: Previously, the effects of damage boosting were only accounted for if the damage-dealing hero was being boosted as they landed a hit. Now, damage is applied to the projectile as it is fired. This means the damage-dealing hero doesn’t need to be boosted when the projectile hits an enemy for the damage boost to be accounted for.
Damage boost is now applied when a projectile is fired rather than when it hits a target
Knockback
Developer Comments: Knockbacks are now less affected by how the enemy was moving when they were hit. Instead of having small or large knockbacks that depend on chance, knockbacks will feel similar regardless of the enemy’s movement leading up to the knockback. Allowing flying heroes, like Mercy when using her Valkyrie ability or D.Va using her Booster ability, to be properly knocked back makes for more fluid, realistic gameplay.
Knockback distance is now more consistent
Heroes that are flying can now be knocked back and slowed
Sound
Developer Comments: With the addition of Baptiste, we wanted to be sure that you can tell when your hits were being buffed or nullified, regardless of what hero you’re playing.
A new sound plays when you land a hit while damage boosted
A new sound plays when you land a hit, but it doesn’t do any damage
HERO UPDATES
Ana
Developer Comments: Giving Nano Boost an instant heal effect enabled players to survive longer and made Ana’s ultimate valuable. However, it was a bit too strong when healing heroes with large health pools.
Nano Boost
Heal reduced from 300 to 250
Doomfist
Developer Comments: Reducing the downtime of Doomfist’s abilities will give him some power back and make his gameplay feel more fluid.
Rising Uppercut
Cooldown reduced from 7 to 6 seconds
Seismic Slam
Cooldown reduced from 7 to 6 seconds
Hanzo
Developer Comments: Because of how dense the environment is on some maps, the Sonic Arrow can feel ineffective in some areas. Increasing Sonic Arrow’s detection radius should make it more effective.
Sonic Arrow
Detection radius increased from 7 to 9 meters
Junkrat
Developer Comments: Junkrat is one of the best barrier and tank busters in the game, and this change will help solidify this role. This doesn’t change the Frag Launcher’s explosive damage, which remains at 80. The total damage for direct impact is now 130, up from 120. Since we increased Frag Launcher’s damage output, Junkrat builds his ultimate too quickly. We’re increasing the cost of his ultimate to balance this change with his increased damage-dealing capabilities.
Frag Launcher
Impact damage increased from 40 to 50
Rip-Tire
Cost increased by 10%
Lúcio
Developer Comments: The knockback on Lúcio's Soundwave is a great tool for pushing enemies into situations that get them killed, so they should be rewarded an offensive assist for doing so. Lúcio’s ability to increase his teammate’s speed was too strong, especially when used on high health/low range heroes. We’re decreasing the overall power of Lúcio's Speed Boost but increasing the speed bonus he gets from using Wall Ride so his mobility isn’t impacted too much.
Amp It Up
Speed Boost’s amplification reduced from 70% to 50%
Cross Fade
Speed Boost’s effect reduced from 30% to 20%
Sonic Amplifier
Soundwave now counts towards Offensive AssistsWall Rider
Speed buff increased from 20% to 40%
McCree
Developer Comments: After reducing armor’s effectiveness for all heroes, Fan the Hammer doesn’t need to deal quite as much damage. Increasing Deadeye’s damage after being locked on for a bit makes it more effective when attacking high health, static targets (like barriers) and heroes with over 250 health. It will not impact how dangerous this is for heroes under 250 health.
Fan the Hammer
Damage reduced from 55 to 50
Deadeye
Damage per second increased from 275 to 550 after locking onto targets for 1.5 seconds
Mei
Developer Comments: Increasing the damage of Mei’s primary fire should make her Freeze and Icicle move combination more potent. Making the pillars on Mei’s Ice Wall easier to destroy means less waiting for the wall to disappear on its own and more opportunities to counter it.
Endothermic Blaster
Primary fire damage increased from 2.25 to 2.75 (45 to 55 damage per second)
Ice Wall
Health reduced from 500 to 400
Moira
Developer Comments: These minor changes make Moira’s passive healing effect on Biotic Grasp slightly more effective when topping off an ally’s health.
Biotic Grasp
Heal over time duration increased from 3 to 4 seconds
Total healing increased from 50 to 65
Orisa
Developer Comments: As a defensive tank, Orisa can have trouble pushing forward with the team. Allowing Orisa to move faster while firing should make it easier to apply pressure on the enemy team and use her barrier in proactive ways.
Fusion Driver
Movement speed penalty while firing reduced from 50% to 30%
Pharah
Developer Comments: This change sets the Rocket Launcher’s minimum damage to where it was before we rebalanced its direct impact and explosive damage in a recent patch.
Rocket Launcher
Minimum explosion damage increased from 16.25 to 20
Reaper
Developer Comments: A recent change that increased Reaper’s healing while he dealt damage was a bit too strong, sometimes making opponents feel like Reaper was unstoppable.
The Reaping
Healing received from dealing damage reduced from 50% to 40%
Soldier: 76
Developer Comments: This change should potentially allow Soldier: 76 to kill an enemy hero one shot sooner. Reducing the time between when you use Sprint and when you can fire should make the ability more fluid and responsive. Giving Tactical Visor the ability to target Junkrat’s RIP-Tire and Baptiste’s Immortality Field drone is a quality of life improvement, since these are both critical targets.
Pulse Rile
Damage increased from 19 to 20
Sprint
Delay before you can fire the weapon after using Sprint reduced from .5 to .3 seconds
Tactical Visor
Can target RIP-Tire and Immortality Field
Sombra
Developer Comments: The cooldown on Hack often made it feel less effective to target health packs instead of players. This will make both health packs and players viable targets for hacking.
Hack
Cooldown is reduced by half when hacking a health pack
Changed the visual appearance to more clearly indicate when something has been hacked
Symmetra
Developer Comments: This will allow Symmetra to more consistently reach peak damage output from her Photon Projector.
Photon Projector
Primary Fire’s damage ramps up 20% faster
Torbjörn
Developer Comments: Torbjörn’s survivability was a bit low, so we’ve shifted some power from his Overload ability to his base health.
General
Base health increased by 50 armor (250 maximum health)
Overload
Armor gain reduced from 150 to 100
Widowmaker
Developer Comments: Infra-Sight had no counter to its effect, so it now ends when Widowmaker dies. To balance out its higher risk of use, Infra-Sight now reveals enemy health bars to Widowmaker’s team.
Infra-Sight
Reveals enemy health bars
Now canceled on death
Wrecking Ball
Developer Comments: This will make Adaptive Shield a more powerful survival tool, since being forced out of Roll mode left Wrecking Ball more susceptible to fire.
Adaptive Shield
No longer cancels Roll mode
Zarya
Developer Comments: Zarya’s damage greatly increases when at high energy, while also gaining increased beam size and a larger explosion radius. This often allowed Zarya to deal too much damage and made the explosions from the Alternate Fire on her Particle Cannon nearly impossible to avoid. This change will still allow Zarya to deal a lot of damage, but makes it more difficult to actually apply the damage.
Particle Cannon
Alternative Fire’s explosion radius changed to 2 meters, regardless of energy level
Zenyatta
Developer Comments: Zenyatta’s Orb of Discord makes him a nearly irreplaceable support hero on your team. We’re reducing its impact for Zenyatta’s team, but increasing the potency of the Orb of Destruction to compensate for its lesser effect.
Orb of Destruction
Damage increased from 46 to 48
Orb of Discord
Effect reduced from 30% to 25%
BUG FIXES
Callouts
Fixed a bug where the “Need Healing” callout wouldn’t display in chat if the hero you targeted didn’t have healing abilities
Camera
Fixed a bug where, when playing certain heroes, the camera would clip into the hero when looking straight upwards
Career Stats Menu
Fixed a bug where the season labels for Competitive CTF and Competitive 6v6 Elimination didn’t display
General
Fixed a bug where damage boost stat tracking was incorrect in some circumstances
Hero Gallery
Fixed a bug where, if switching between Junkrat Skins, one of the bombs on his vest would spin
Heroes
Ana
Fixed a bug where Ana’s clothes would clip into her hip pouch while doing the Yut Nori emote
Ashe
Fixed a bug that prevented audio feedback from playing to indicate ammo was low on Ashe’s rifle if it had three or fewer bullets
Doomfist
Fixed a bug where Seismic Slam didn’t pull in enemies as intended
D.Va
Fixed a bug that made D.Va very difficult to knock back while she was firing her Fusion Cannons
Genji
Fixed a bug that caused Genji’s Dragonblade to end before the deflect duration was complete
Fixed a bug where Genji would be knocked back unusually far when using Swift Strike to hit Doomfist’s Rocket Punch
Hanzo
Fixed a bug where Hanzo’s leg would visibly move while he was in his Meditate pose
Mercy
Fixed a bug where Mercy’s left knee would bend unnaturally when stunned by McCree’s Flashbang
Orisa
Fixed a bug that made Orisa very difficult to knock back while she was firing her Fusion Driver
Reaper
Fixed a bug where a button on the shoulder of Reaper’s Lu Bu skin appeared to be floating
Reinhardt
Fixed a bug where a piece on Reinhardt’s back displayed incorrectly while using the Guan Yu skin in the Hammer Down highlight intro
Fixed an issue that allowed Reinhardt’s Earthshatter to hit people further off the ground than intended in specific circumstances
Sombra
Fixed a bug where Sombra’s stealth exiting sound effect wouldn’t play if an emote was used to exit stealth mode
Fixed a bug where Sombra couldn’t quick melee while using her Hack ability
Symmetra
Fixed a bug where Symmetra would gain ultimate charge while casting Photon Barrier
Torbjörn
Fixed a bug that prevented Torbjörn from using Molten Core in custom games if Ability 2 was disabled
Widowmaker
Fixed a bug that prevented Widowmaker’s Venom Mine from damaging a hero if they triggered it at the edge of its trigger radius

Maps
Hollywood
Fixed a bug where the winning team’s hero lineup wouldn’t display correctly
Horizon Lunar Colony
Fixed a bug that caused the hanging tires near the first point to rotate a Self Destructing D.Va mech
Paris
Fixed a bug where the sounds coming from the Nous vous surveillons apartment weren’t playing
Overwatch League Skins
Fixed issues with the colors of skins for new Overwatch League teams
Previous live patch notes.
Baptiste enters live servers and 19 Heroes get some balancing, in addition to armor tweaks and more.

The official Cosplay Battle Europe projects are done and we have 6 amazing entries from 6 European countries, whose topics were chosen by the community and that the artists put a huge amount of effort into. Now it's time to vote for the best and get a chance to win one of 10 Overwatch goodie bags filled with art books, Funko Pops, plushies and a lot more!
Now let's get started with the first entry, United Kingdom's Forest Spirit Orisa:

Then it's on to France and a more regal theme, with their very red Magni Torbjörn:

It seems that Spain and Italy share similar tastes, as the penultimate entry is also Genji, with the Italians picking the Blackwatch version:

And finally, we have Germany and Dragon Symmetra:

Some truly impressive pieces there. Now head on over to the voting page and share your opinion there, as the voting closes on March 24th and we find out what the Overwatch community likes best on the 26th!

We just got word that Overwatch Hero 30 will be arriving on Live servers next Tuesday! The support/DOS hybrid has proven to be popular on the PTR and we also got a very in-depth Q&A session with the devs covering both his lore backstory and gameplay mechanics and balance.
The Q&A delved into a whole lot of detail over on the forums, with the lore section being really huge so we'll just be focusing on the gameplay related questions here. Head on over to the forums for the full q&a.
Gameplay Q&A (source)
GAMEPLAY

Geoff Goodman's reply
Geoff Goodman: The Immortality Field has many disadvantages compared to other support ultimates such as Transcendence and Sound Barrier. If a Baptiste player can work around these disadvantages they can potentially use this ability to even stop another team’s ultimate, which can be a huge advantage to his team. This is one of the things that makes Baptiste so exciting to play!
Geoff Goodman's reply
Geoff Goodman: Baptiste will be ready for the live servers within the next couple weeks. As with all new hero releases, there will be a one-week period after he is released before he is available for competitive play.
Josh Noh's reply
Josh Noh: This was indeed a bug and will be fixed by the time Baptiste is released.
Josh Noh's reply
Josh Noh: The Immortality Field can be destroyed very quickly when multiple enemies are focusing it as it only has 250 health and doesn’t move. If it does end up being too powerful we can always lower the health or increase the cooldown to a more reasonable amount.
Josh Noh's reply
Josh Noh: The Amplification Matrix is a powerful ultimate that could potentially enable teammates to one shot an enemy. It does have its downsides too in that it only boosts projectiles, has a short duration, and holds a static position so enemies can simply avoid line of sight until the ultimate is over, making the timing of placing the Amplification Matrix very important. Sometimes it’s much stronger to use it for healing your allies!

It's been a particularly active PTR this time around, with multiple patches changing up Heroes. Today's brings some QoL and visual improvements to new Hero Baptiste as well as an increase to Junkrat's Ult cost, while Zarya's alt fire radius continues to get tinkered with. There's also a lot of Baptiste bug fixes, mostly related to the Immortality Field, as well as some Lucio wall ride improvements.
PTR March 6 (source)
HERO UPDATES
Baptiste
Biotic Launcher
Can now be stopped from automatically reloading by switching the Automatic Reload option to OFF. This option defaults to ON
Immortality Field
Made significant changes to its visual appearance and sounds
Junkrat
Frag Launcher
Impact damage changed from 60 to 50
RIP-Tire
Cost increased by 10%
Developer Comments: Since the recent increase of Frag Launcher’s damage output, Junkrat has been building his ultimate too quickly. We’re increasing the cost of his ultimate to balance this change with his increased damage-dealing capabilities.
Zarya
Particle Cannon
Alternative Fire’s explosion radius changed to 2 meters, regardless of energy level
BUG FIXES
Heroes
Baptiste
Fixed a bug that allowed Baptiste’s Immortality Field to be placed under a payload
Fixed a bug where Baptiste’s Immortality Field was not destroyed when run over by the payload
Fixed a bug where Baptiste’s Immortality Field prevented death in out of bounds areas
Fixed a bug that allowed Baptiste’s Biotic Launcher to heal through barriers
Doomfist
Fixed a bug that caused Doomfist to not lose his upward jumping movement when using Rocket Punch while in the air
Fixed a bug that caused Doomfist to not move while using Rocket Punch if he was recently knocked backed
Junkrat
Fixed a bug where Junkrat’s Steel Trap didn’t make a sound when it landed
Lúcio
Fixed a bug where Lúcio’s wall jump speed was lower than expected